I’ve always been into the moon missions and have seen a few PBS type shows on it, but I would love to see long, en-edited footage of the langings. All the stuff you normally don’t see. I hear about the astonauts slipping on the surface, playing golf, driving their million dollar golf carts around.
Anyone know of a good DVD that is out that has stuff like this?
A video would work as well,. but I’d really prefer a DVD.
You might enjoy For All Mankind. I saw it a couple years ago and it has a lot of amazing footage, most of which I’d never seen before.
It’s available on DVD, although I saw it on a movie channel, so I can’t offer an opinion on the DVD transfer.
Look for the Collector’s Choice Double Feature (2-sided) DVD “NASA,” which I bought at Target about a year-and-a-half ago, for the grand sum of $8. Tons and tons of great stuff for space geeks on this: six short NASA-produced documentaries, plus lots of info screens, a JFK speech, trivia questions, biographies, etc.
The documentary segments are: “The Eagle Has Landed” (the first moon landing, July '69); “Houston We’ve Got a Problem” (Apollo 13); “Apollo 15 (In the Mountains of the Moon)” (with lots of activity on the moon); “Apollo 16 - Nothing So Hidden” (Rover footage, lunar liftoff, Mission Control problem-solving); “Challenger - Disaster and Investigation”; and “NASA, the 25th Year”.
I also highly recommend a generously-sized coffee-table book of lunar photography that was published a couple of years ago – “To the Moon,” I think. IIRC, the photos were all new transfers from the original negatives, or somesuch. The camera was a top-of-the-line Leica. In any event, the images are breathtaking.
Sorry, that book was “Full Moon”. The readers’ comments on Amazon say it all.
For an online version of all things Apollo, including a bazillion images, try the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal. I used it extensively in my Apollo research.
I just picked up the HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon on DVD. It’s a dramatization of all the important events in the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs. About 50% actors and sets and 50% NASA and TV footage. Excellent stuff.
NASA has a DVD series containing all of their manned space programs, from Mercury through Apollo, Apollo-Soyuz, Skylab, and the Shuttle. They are called “NASA - 25 Years”, and they are produced by Madacy Entertainment.
I found 3 volumes of the series in the discount bins at the local Future Shop store. I think I paid about $7 or $8 for each of them.
Let me chime in on For All Mankind. The DVD is superb (probably one of the best film to video transfers I’ve ever seen) and the commentary by Al Reinert and Eugene Cernan really let’s you know how stupid it was of us to cancel the Apollo program. The film’s a must have for any space geek.
Cool. I’m looking those DVD’s up on amazon as I type this.
Any other good ones out there?
Check out the Nasa Mission Reports. I’ve got both Apollo 11 volumes.
Volume 1 has the Apollo 11 press kit, pre-flight mission report, post-flight report and a transcript of the post-flight crew press conference. It also includes a CD-ROM containing 1400 photos taken during the mission and and two movies in MPEG format.
Volume 2 has the technical crew debriefing and a CD-ROM with an interactive panoramic image of tranquility base and the entire 2.5 hour long un-edited television broadcast from tranquility base.
They’re also available for the X-15 program, two Mercury flights, one Gemini flight, most of the Apollo flights (16 and 17 are supposed to be released this year), the early Shuttle flights and other space programs.
Cool stuff!
Eric
On your advice, I picked up a copy at Best Buy yesterday! Eight bucks. It was in the “specialty” section with the Playboy and wrestling videos. :rolleyes:
Thanks Scrivener!
Hope you like it, Kamandi.
The love-it-or-hate-it thing about that DVD is that it is all NASA-produced (as I said), with none of the inflated sense of drama or over-produced slickness of a network or cable-produced program. Remember the no-nonsense educational videos you sat through in science classes in school? Bingo. As dry as a vermouth-free martini. Retro cool, if you will.
I tried showing the “Apollo 11” segment to a couple of friends a while back, and they both fell asleep! [??#@%??] It wasn’t that late at night!